Fate of TV antenna to be decided

January 10, 2006|Tribune Staff Report

ROSELAND -- Betty Scofield may finally get her day before the Roseland Town Council. Scofield has an antenna next to her home that she means to keep, but the town means to take it down. The Roseland Town Council will convene for a special meeting at 3:30 p.m. Wednesday at the Roseland Town Hall to allow Scofield to appeal a ruling that the 50-foot television antenna violates the town's "junk building ordinance." The offending antenna has been in place, Scofield said last year, since 1968. Scofield received a letter last year from the town advising her that David Snyder had judged that the antenna violated the ordinance, and, if she wanted, to appeal the decision or pay for the town to remove it. Snyder is a member of the town council and is the town's zoning commissioner. The letter advised her to appeal the decision at the council's Nov. 8, 2005, meeting, but the issue had been put off until this week. Snyder had said the tower violated the ordinance because it hadn't been used for quite some time and that it's an eyesore. Scofield's attorney, Peter Agostino, has said the antenna is "grandfathered in" and can't be removed unless Scofield wants to remove it. And, Scofield said, there is nothing wrong with her antenna.